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How Wolfram Alpha's Copyright Claims Could Change Software
snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister suggests that Wolfram Research's claim to copyright of results returned by the Wolfram Alpha engine could have significant ramifications for the software industry. 'While software companies routinely retain sole ownership of their software and license it to users, Wolfram Research has taken the additional step of claiming ownership of the output of the software itself,' McAllister writes, pointing out that it is 'at least theoretically possible to copyright works generated by machines.' And, under current copyright law, if any Wolfram claim to authorship of the output of its engine is upheld, by extension the same rules will apply to other information services in similar cases as well. In other words, 'If unique presentations based on software-based manipulation of mundane data are copyrightable, who retains what rights to the resulting works?'"
We should be restraining copyright, not expanding it.
Careful son, that's commie talk.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
This opens Pandora's box like you wouldn't believe.
Hey, that means Pandora owns all of that music, and no longer the RIAA. This could be revolutionary!
My webcomic
SIr:
Pissing on graves has been copyrighted by Wolfram Research, Inc. For each instance of pissing, a royalty fee of $563.87 will be paid to Wolfram Research, Inc.
Sincerely,
Wolfram.
I hope he never dies. I don't want to see copyright carried over into the afterlife. If he does die, we would have to kill NYCL to chase him down.
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
They've just trained teams of underpaid humans to answer the search results. That's how they get a valid copyright.
Okay, I'll admit that I'd missed that completely when I was talking to the lawyers and reading the law for myself.
The guy who turns around and punches you in the face for coming up with a really stupid analogy.